Paulsen Website Wins Gold Mouse Award

3rd District Congressman awarded for quality of his website, one of just 38 in Congress to capture the honor out of 620 evaluated websites.

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Congressman Erik Paulsen (MN-03) was presented with the Gold Mouse Award for his Congressional website last night during a ceremony honoring the top websites in Congress. The award, chosen by the independent Congressional Management Foundation (CMF), is given to the top websites in the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate, including both committee and official leadership websites.

Out of 620 total websites evaluated by CMF, Paulsen’s was one of 38 to receive the prestigious Gold Mouse Award. Only four websites were given a higher award, and Paulsen was the only freshman Republican given the Gold Mouse Award.

"My number one priority in Congress is constituent service and an important part of that effort is having an informative, effective and interactive website,” Paulsen said. “I consider my website to be my ‘online office’ and I was thrilled to accept this award for one of the best websites in Congress. I encourage my constituents to continue utilizing this important tool to stay engaged in the future."

The 111th Congress Gold Mouse Awards are part of CMF’s Partnership For A More Perfect Union, which seeks to improve the quality of communication between Members of Congress and their constituents. For this project CMF partnered with researchers from several universities to study how Members of Congress can use the Internet to improve communications with their constituents and to promote greater participation in the legislative process.

Websites were graded on how well they incorporate five core principles that CMF identified through research as critical for effectiveness: know your audience, provide timely and targeted content that meets their needs, make the site easy to use, foster interaction both on and offline, and add value through innovation.

For more information on 111th Congress Gold Mouse Project report, including a full listing of all winners, please visit www.pmpu.org. ###

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: April 22, 2010 CONTACT: Luke Friedrich (952) 405-8510 / Andrew Foxwell (202) 225-2871